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So you got skunked. Seriously what does it mean? That means you were badly beaten in a game, right? Well, I wish. Say it over and over and over again and it starts to sound weird. Anything to do with “unk” is just not good. That is why similar words sound just as funky, pun intended, eg funk and gunk. But, don’t forget bunk, dunk, hunk, junk, punk, and sunk.

But in reality, your dog got skunked. Why, oh why does this keep happening? As a dog owner, I have issues. Ongoing and longstanding issues. Oh, let me tell you the horrors. My dogs get skunked. Luckily it seems to be a seasonal problem of late summer and early fall. As a youngster growing up in a rural area, our dogs got skunked. I remember how my mother would bathe the stinky dogs with either lemon juice or tomato juice or tomato sauce. From my recollection, it worked great. However, it seems that over time I swear the skunk smell has become much more potent.

There was a time my husband and I were camping, on a merry stroll we were, and my dog went crazy. She starting barking at a tree. At the base of the tree. There was nothing there. She started to attack a pile of leaves and sure enough, there was a skunk happily hibernating. He let her know he was not appreciative of her and we dragged her off with the wet odor of skunk in our mouths. Yuck!!

Another time, our dog ran into our house, so excited, with soaking wet skunk-sprayed fur and proceeded to rub herself all over the carpet in the middle of the night. Didn’t she know we had to work the next day? The thick odor makes sleeping very difficult, as well as the increasing anger that goes with this situation.

I would never admit to it, but at some point in time, there may have been a dead skunk in my living room, with entrails all about, and a proud dog to boot. How fun! A new job for the husband!

I wanted to put said dog in time out or at least on skunk restriction. I wanted to have a sit down. Look dog, you’re not doing us any favors here. You are not protecting the fort, in fact you are allowing chemical warfare into the fort of which you should be protecting. If only that would work.

So I tried the lemonade, and I tried the tomato juice and even tomato sauce. It seemed to have lost its efficiency. Perhaps my memories were bad as to how well those old tricks worked. Online I go and find a new recipe. Hydrogen peroxide, baking soda and dish soap. So instead of hitting the odor with acids, now we are hitting it with bases. Doesn’t anyone know the chemical composition of skunk spray by now? The new formula seemed to work pretty well, except I lost my fingerprints during the treatment and I’m not so sure how that affects the dog’s skin, but with my increasing anger over the dog’s defunct learning curve, I hoped that the burn and the bath would deter the dang dog. Um, nope.

As for the carpet, I can’t spread tomato juice all over and I’m sure hydrogen peroxide will make for bleach spots, so I tried a solution of vinegar and water ala the internet. I sprayed it all over the carpet – works great for a day or two, if you don’t mind the smell of vinegar. I repeated this treatment every couple of days. It turns out, from my now all knowing experience that the skunk smell naturally dissipates after approximately one month. Or it could be that one becomes so used to the foul stench in your own home that you don’t notice it after a month.

Why do I write this angry blog? Last week, my dog got skunked. Yet, that sounds wrong, as if he was a victim when I’m sure he was the instigator. Can you believe I was fresh out of hydrogen peroxide? I hauled Mr. Dog into tub and went after him with a mixture of vinegar and dish wash soap. I have to say it worked great for several days. And again, if you don’t mind the smell of vinegar. But that nasty skunk smell seems to have a way of working itself back up into the fur and up into your nose.

I now have lots of ideas. Has anyone started selling this skunk juice? Perhaps someone, somewhere has or could start a big skunk farm. You could sell the juice to the police to use as riot dispersing bombs. You could sell it to the general public as an alternative to mace. People could use it on their natural born enemies so that they would have to call off from work. It makes me wonder, how many people have actually called into work to say “I can’t come in today, I’ve been skunked.”

I am always amazed when driving down the road with the air on in my vehicle and I catch a whiff of that foul odor. I roll down the windows to rid the car of that vile smell and it always takes a couple of miles before I stop smelling it.

The smell used to seem unusual or even interesting. Nowadays, it just makes me mad. I am dubious of trying a commercial product as most of the internet gives it a small remark and then moves on to home remedies. But I’m willing to try. I also just recently read something about minty mouthwash. Oh, how I look forward to trying that as if I have nothing better to do. Thanks dog!

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